en he wished to convince
himself that he had heard aright and to assure some sophomorical young
lawyer that he had not been asleep at all, but had caught every word of
his long-winded statement of the case. The judge's ideas came back to him
with their usual easy flow, and before the next sentence was enunciated he
had made a mental summing-up of the case and given judgment for the
plaintiff.

"I mean," continued Vina, "dat Fader Abe's got de whitest soul ebber yer
see: he couldn't do a mean ting, no matter how much money de debbil 'greed
to pay him for't. Fus' time I ebber see him war down in Lousianny. My ole
marster had sole me away from my husband an' from John Brown: she war a
little ting den, only six mo'ths, an' oughtn't to have been weaned, but I
don't s'pose he cared whether she libbed or died, and de slabe-driber
wouldn't take her--"

"How _did_ you," interrupted Mrs. Judge Fairdealer with the curiosity of a
true woman, "ever give your little girl such an unsuitable name as _John_
Brown?"

("Why couldn't the woman let her go on with her story?" thought the judge.
What did he care how that impish little creature, whom he had always
regarded as old Abram's granddaughter, and who glared at him with such
savage malignity from her piercing black eye (no figure of speech, for she
had but one) when with his foot and cane he gently rolled her off the
door-mat, where he found her coiled up asleep on his entrance to the
house,--what did he care how that mixture of chimpanzee and evil sprite,
to whom were to be attributed nine-tenths of the mischief done in the
neighborhood, came by her unmaidenly cognomen?)

"John Brown didn' hab no name den: she war jus' my baby, dat war all. I
use to t'ink I'd call her for her fader, an' his name war George--mos'
consniptious rascal ebber yer see, de han'somest man in de whole township
(John Brown takes arter him a sight), but so powerful ugly" (_ugly_ being
used here in reference to disposition) "dat de only way de oberseer could
make him mind was to hab a parcel ob de boys hold him down while he kicked
him in de mouf. Wall, short time befo' John Brown was born he kicked one
of his eyes out dat ar way, and I nussed him an' tended him till he got
well; an' when John Brown come, 'clar' to goodness ef she didn' have jus'
only one eye too! Wall, I lubbed dat ar George wid all my soul, Miss'
Fairdealer. Mean an' sneakin' a nigger as ebber libbed, but I didn' know
it den; an', anyway,